Thrown in the deep end
by rorypondtheboywholived
Summary: Sabella Caverly from District Six was chosen to be the female tribute for her District for the 62nd Hunger Games and she is determined to do everything in her power to win.
1. Intruder

_Well, this is my first published fanfiction. Yaaaaay! *party poppers* Constructive criticism is always welcome and depending on how things go with this chapter, more will soon follow!_  
><em>I hope you enjoy.<em>  
><strong><em>-Bethany <em>**

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><p>I can hear him uttering a loud cry from pain and fear, writhing on the ground, his blood pouring out in every direction, mixing with the sand and making a reddish brown mixture, the careers laughing and mocking him, his pale hand trying to reach out for mine in a desperate attempt to be saved…and then I hear the canon fire. And I know it's all over. All hope was gone and his hand lay on the ground, still stretched out towards me and his eyes wide and lifeless, staring right at my own bright eyes.<p>

I wake up in a cold sweat and kick my way out of my sleeping bag. Even though I knew that Aleksander would have to die so that I was a step closer to victory, that didn't stop me from being sad about it. I cried, yes. I didn't care how many people in Panem saw me do so, it's good for entertainment purposes, right? He was a good friend and I'm glad that if I was to go up against anyone that it would be him. I'll never forget him and I'll miss him terribly.

Wiping my wet eyes, I sat up and tried to work out how many tributes still stood. That would hopefully distract me from Aleks. The careers from one and two, the boy from five, both from ten and the girl from eleven. That made eight and if you added me, that was nine.

One more has to die before our family and friends are interviewed and I am determined to not be the next simpering, fallen tribute. I was determined to make that the person who killed Aleksander the one who met their death next. He was too good to die and yes, my feelings on his death are conflicted and do contradict each other.

Suddenly I snapped out of my thoughts of Aleksander's death and how many tributes I needed to destroy and I was transported straight back to the arena. It was a replica of a baron desert, poisonous snakes, spiders, scorpions and a huge lack in water and shade.

I'd managed to make camp in some large rocks forming a kind of alcove miles away from the cornucopia and approximately another two miles away from a small source of water which was placed there to avoid an anti-climactic show where the tributes all died from dehydration.

It was approximately five in the morning and I knew that I would not be able to get back to sleep, especially not after the way I can see Aleks's bleeding and battered face every time I closed my eyes and how I can hear him screaming for help every time there's just the smallest moment of silence.

Looking over the top of the alcove, I noticed a shadow walk past. Immediately, I reached for my club, I held it so tightly that if it were human, I'd have suffocated it. I was prepared to bludgeon the intruder to death if I had to.

I crept out of the alcove, being careful to try and not let the low rising sun cast my shadow, naturally this was damn near impossible. I could now see that the person who was in the area was a girl and she was facing away from me. The perfect opportunity to club her around the back of the head, by the time she would see my shadow behind her, it would be too late.

But before I could even get to her, she turned around and saw me with my club raised.

Now I could see her face, I could see that it was the girl was from District Eleven. I remember her from the opening ceremonies, she made quite the impression and I remember being very annoyed by her beauty and the way the crowd seemed to love her more than myself.

The girl held her hands up in protest.

'Don't kill me!' she cried out, backing away slightly. How odd it was for her to ask to be spared, after all, the aim of the game was to kill or be killed. She has to die and she clearly knew that. Everyone did.

'Why not?' I asked her, hoping that this would start up a false sense of security. Trick her in to thinking that I'm considering actually letting her walk away alive and unharmed.

'Because…' she paused and gulped, obviously dehydrated, weak and possibly on the verge of heatstroke. 'I need an ally.'

I couldn't help but snicker. An ally? With the enemy? Somehow, I didn't see that one working out well. Of course I could be her ally, befriend her, find out her weaknesses, maybe make her heat stroke worse on accident or just hit her around the head whilst she was sleeping and get rid of her that way. Allies made for easy targets and maybe, just maybe, she's planning on doing the same to me. If so, I'd just have to do it first.

After weighing up the pros and cons of the idea in my head, I nodded and extended my hand out to hers.

She gingerly held it and shook it, sealing our agreement. Her touch was light and I dared not hold her hand too tightly in fear that it would break off of her tiny wrist.

'You're Sabella. From Six, right?' she asked, dropping her hand and moving away from me slightly, her eyes looking slightly above my head.

Then I remembered that I was still brandishing that club, I dropped my arm, apologised and she came a little closer, looking a lot easier and more calm than she had done when I was threatening her with a blunt blood stained weapon.

'I am.' I replied gently. 'And you're Elana from Eleven. I must say that your stylist is very talented.' She smiled gently and pointed towards the rocky alcove.

Turning, I walked back over to it and sat inside, Elana following behind me.

'It's not much but it provides some shade, a hiding place and if you walk for half an hour in that direction, you'll come across a watering hole.' I explained, Elana nodding taking in the few pieces of information that was entering in to her pretty little skull.

Elana was a rather thin girl, which was to be expected of course, with light brown hair and her skin was slightly tanned but covered in sweat. I wouldn't be surprised if a girl like her had a lot of sponsors. Everyone wants to help the beautiful, innocent little girl who was slowly dying, didn't they? She was the type of girl who'd pull on your heartstrings. May be that was her strategy, be innocent and heartbreaking to make the Capitol fall in love with her.

I opened up the bag that I had managed to steal from the boy in district five after he dropped it running from the Cornucopia and took out a bottle of water and a spare pair of socks.

I soaked the sock in the water and pressed it against Elana's head.

'There.' I smiled gently. 'Hopefully that'll help your heat stroke.' I was lying of course. Doing that would just insulate heat and make it worse, she didn't need to know that though. I have to win and I'd do anything to make sure that I did.

'Thank you.' she said quietly, holding on to my hand. 'Bless you.'

Even when she said that, I didn't feel guilty about lying to her and aiding in her death. I just nodded in response and prised her hand away from mine. I was convinced that putting her out of her misery was the much kinder thing to do than let her slowly die in the boiling wasteland.

She began staring at the side of the rock, I looked over to where she was looking and crawling up the side of the rock was a scorpion, most likely a poisonous one that the Capitol put there to make the Game more interesting but however, there was a lack of food and survival is necessary. I grasped my club and quickly flung it at the critter, twisting it, applying lots of pressure, trying to make sure that it was dead.

After I was totally sure, I cut off the stinger with a sharp rock and Elana watched, completely fascinated. It was if she'd never seen someone do something like that before.

I paused for a moment before handing it to her.

'Here. You have it.' I couldn't be sure if it was deadly or not and if it was, oh well. At least it wasn't me who died and I could keep a look out for scorpions like it, to give to my enemies or to eat myself, depending on the outcome.

She looked at me confused.

'You sure?' she asked, holding it away from her, almost as if she wanted to give it back.

I smiled, reassuring her.

'Of course I am.'

She gently pulled the hard shell off the dead creature and picked at the raw meat and eating it, proving it to be seemingly fine. No matter, I have some left over snake meat in my bagvand I can find food easy enough, I can hold out. Living in one of the poorer Districts made me used to holding out, except it's a lot harder now that I've tasted the fine dishes that the people of the Capitol have on a daily basis.

I needed to find out something about how well Elana was getting on it the Games so far, I wasn't doing too badly. I'd killed the boy from District Four and I'd managed to get a wound in my arm that I'd bandaged up with a piece of material I had cut away from my trousers. It was most likely infected but I didn't care about that right now. In all honesty, I'd rather let the other tributes kill each other so I could work on survival in this wasteland and worry about the kill later when I was one of the last ones standing.

Sitting back and propping my feet up against the rock, I yawned and stretched, pushing my arms up against the cool rock, which would heat up as the day goes on.

'Have you killed anyone yet?' I asked. It was probably too forward of me to ask but as long as I got some form of answer so I knew what I was dealing with, so I could devise the best way to kill her so she was dead as soon a possible.

Elana looked at me, her mouth full of Scorpion claw and I just laughed. A genuine, happy laugh. I hadn't done that in a while. The other girl swallowed her mouthful and dropped the shell in to the sand, laughing along with me. Her laugh was loud and almost had a musical edge to it. I put my fingers to my lips and she copied, we both tried to quieten ourselves down so that we weren't found by any predators who might be lurking around the area.

'Yes.' She replied, her voice monotone without a single care. The laughter had completely vanished from her. 'I took down both from Three, the girl from Five and the boy from Eight.' she grinned and saw my facial expression drop slightly. 'Oh and I almost forgot the boy from Nine. That was a shame, he was a nice boy.'

She peeled the sock away from her forehead and turned it over so it was on the cooler side and placed it gently back. It was so hard to believe that a second ago she was an adorable girl who didn't look able to harm a fly and was just giggling like any other girl our ages should be doing but instead, we're forced to live in poverty and fear. The fear of being put in an arena and slaughter each other for the entertainment of the sick people in the Capitol.

'What about you?' she asked me, her voice getting back some form of emotion.

What she had said confirmed my fears and theories. I was dealing with a sadistic little girl who was using her beautiful, virtuous face to gain the trust of other tributes and make them think that she was completely harmless. It struck me that this girl from the District of Agriculture, could literally be the death of me.


	2. Blood, Sweat and Water

Three days later and Elana is weaker than she was before, just by looking at her you could tell she was nearing the end of her spirit.

Her beautiful brown hair was greasy and covered in sweat where she hadn't been well enough to walk the two miles to the watering hole to wash, her tanned skin was covered in sunburn and she throws up what little food she can manage to eat and quite recently, she's been having hallucinations.

Of this I know because she thought she saw her brother in the arena, sat under some shade, drinking ice water. I watched her try and run towards him, weakly saying his name but she didn't get very far before she collapsed from fatigue and weakness, rendering her unconscious for around four hours. When she had finally come round, she was agitated and confused and screamed out for her brother.

Her actions brought on an attack from the Careers and I was sure that the both of us would die at their bloody hands.

Three of them got out of the brawl scarcely unscathed but one had to be carried off for immediate treatment for her head trauma. She did not survive. Although she had plenty of time to stab me in the abdomen before she fell. It wasn't a particularly deep wound but it was enough for me to slowly bleed to death if it wasn't treated. I had to cut off another large strip of material from my trousers and wrap it tightly around me to stem the blood flow.

Now the Careers would surely be coming back for us. The only option we have is to move so it takes them longer to find us and by then, hopefully they would have either turned on each other or, by some miraculous miracle, one of the other tributes would have killed them.

Elana is too weak to be able to move at the moment and that's a problem for me. For us. I knew it would be better for the both of us to kill her but I couldn't do it, not just yet at least.

I hid her in the alcove, whilst I went to collect a large supply of water for us to travel with seeing as I wasn't sure where another source of water was going to be available to us. I assumed there was another source somewhere because the careers hadn't all died of dehydration yet.

If whilst I was gone the Careers came back, they would take out Elana as she's currently an easy target and that would be one less tribute to face, and I'd be another step closer to winning and that's what matters to me. The big win and all the glory at the end.

I'd managed to collect three litres of water for us to have between us but that's all I could get and I wasn't sure if that was enough. I didn't know how long or how far we would have to walk.

The walk back to Elana gave me half an hour to think. I was now aware that Elana had a brother and I couldn't help but think of him watching her slowly die in a hot desert on television. It must be terrible for him to watch his sister suffer like this. What if he thought I was trying to help her? If I kill her, he's not going to be thrilled and he might try to seek revenge in some way. I'd be seen as heartless and cruel but with her in this state, killing her would be the kindest thing to do. An act of agape.

I finally reached the alcove and by the looks of things, the Careers hadn't been here. That's a shame.

I quietly reached out to touch Elana's bony shoulder.

'Lana?' I whispered, brushing her hair out of her face for her with my other hand after I had placed the bottles of water on the ground.

She stirred slightly, indicating to me that she was awake and could hear me. I smiled at her and took my hand away from her shoulder.

She tried to sit up but I held her still by putting my arm across her chest.

'No, no. Stay there for a moment.' I instructed. She obliged, probably not willingly but because she had no strength to fight back.

'We've got to find somewhere new to hide out. The Careers know where we are.' she listened intently, hanging on to every word I said, like she was listening to me read her bedtime story.

'But I-' Elana spoke up but I silenced her by placing my hand over her mouth.

I shook my head and took my hand away.

'Listen to me.' my voice went stern as I spoke to her. 'I know that you're too weak to travel, I know.' I trailed off, not sure of how I am supposed to get us both moving.

She licked her lips, trying to get moisture on them, they were so dry and cracked that sometimes they bled.

'Then leave me here.' she choked out finally. 'I'm just dragging you down. Leave me here and let the Careers find me. It won't take them much to kill me, Bella. Consider it as a way of me helping you win.' she laughed gently and picked up my hand, kissing the back of it.

I shook my head violently, my dark hair whipping my neck.

'It's tempting but no.' I admitted. There was no point in completely hiding my intentions any more. 'I'm going to try and get you strong enough to move, okay?'

She paused for her moment, her breathing was quick and shallow, I could see her contemplating the plan in her head. Finally, she slowly nodded and mumbled an 'okay.'

'Hold tight.' I said. Before she had time to question my words, I picked her up. She was unsurprisingly light. 'Now, I'm going to take you down to the watering hole, when we're there, we're going to get you washed and hopefully cooled off slightly. I don't know if it will work but it's worth a shot.'

She nodded and held on to me tightly. It was almost like carrying a new born baby. I was a bit worried about leaving the water, the backpacks and our small amount of food unattended with the Careers on our tail but Elana isn't anywhere strong enough to hold on to it all and I couldn't because I was holding on to Elana.

We'd just have to hope that the Careers have a strategy plan. One that involves invading at night to reduce the risk of being seen or heard.

We walked silently for ten minutes before Elana finally piped up.

'If I wanted any one else apart from me to win, it'd be you. You've been so kind to me.' she looked down at the ground. 'I wanted to thank you.'

I chuckled quietly.

'Thank you.' I'm not sure if I wanted her to win, it'd be a marvel if she did win somehow.

When we finally reached the water, I gently set her down and knelt by her.

'Right, I know this might be a little forward but you're going to have to take off your clothes so we can get you ventilated and so we can try and cool all of you at the same time.' I scratched the back of my head awkwardly, not sure how she'd take that.

Thankfully, she was fine with it. I helped her undress and set her clothes next to me.

She dragged herself in to the lukewarm water and stood there, occasionally trying to splash the water at me and giggling quietly.

Once she'd got her childishness out of her system, I helped her wash her hair and untangling it gently with my fingers.

I let her float in the water for few a minutes and as she did so, I washed her clothes. I didn't see a point in letting them dry because they'd dry as Elana wore them as it got so hot in this particular arena.

My hand reached out to hers and I helped her climb out of the water source.

I dressed her and picked her back up, ready to walk back to our things.

Just as we were about to leave, something in the sky caught Elana's eye and she pointed up towards it. I looked up and grinned as it floated down and landed softly at our feet.

The silky silver parachute hid the item from us and I bent down and picked it up, being careful not to drop Elana.

After inspection, I held it out to my ally.

'It's for you.' I told her, a grin spread across my face.

She looked at me in shock and I nodded, holding it to her further. Elana gingerly took it and looked.

'They're muscle relaxants, I think. It's hard for us to find you some cool water and and shade to reduce your core body temperature but at least we can relax you now.'

Elana gave thanks to her sponsor and mentor and took a few of the relaxants and tightly held on to the pot for dear life.

'Bella?'

'Yeah?' I answered.

Elana spoke in her small, quiet voice.

'You know I have a brother and yet you've told me nothing about your family…' she lowered her voice even more, it gave me the impression that she thought it was rude to ask.

I sighed heavily and laughed nervously.

'I have a sister.' I told her. Elana looked at me and she looked pretty confused, with her hair stuck to her neck and slicked down on her head.

'And she didn't volunteer for you?' Her voice sounded almost outraged.

I gulped and held on to Elana tighter as we walked back towards our little camp site. I was eager to get back to we could get our things and walk out to another hiding spot. Mainly, I wanted some food but Lana needed feeding more than I did. With any luck, she won't vomit it back up this time.

'No…She's too old for the Games any way.' I finally answered Elana's question. She nodded and apologised for being rude on the matter. I told her it was okay, she wasn't rude about any thing.

As we were nearing the camp site, I saw figures in the distance, moving around our alcove.

My only guess is that it's the Careers. Those slimy bastards.

I quickly set Elana down on the ground and got back up, intense pain rushing through my body, the source of it coming from the wound in my abdomen. I tried to brush it off and carry on like I was okay.

'Find somewhere to hide until I come and get you when the coast is clear.' I began running up towards the alcove but I was stopped by Elana's voice ringing in my head.

'Stay there! I'm coming with you!' she shouted, trying to scramble to her feet. I ran back and covered her mouth again.

'What do you think you're doing? Be quiet before they see us!' I whispered aggressively. 'Plus, you're not going there. You'll be killed before you even get the chance to fight.' I spat out the last word and Elana reached up to wipe it from her face.

I let go of the girl and pushed her away. I sprinted up to the Careers and the alcove. I held my abdomen tightly, the pain not subsiding, to my dismay.

One of them, the final Career girl, turned and saw me. She nudged one of the other boys.

'Look who it is, Finbar.' She said. Her voice was sickly sweet and it didn't match her face at all. She had short black hair and she had an upturned nose that reminded me of the nose of a pig.

The one who I can only assume is Finbar turned, holding my club and grinned.

'It's Caverly!' he grinned showing a line of yellow, crooked teeth. 'Where's your little friend? She dead?' he asked me, laughing and flinging my club over his shoulder.

The Career girl smirked, picking up one of the bottles of water and drinking from it. 'Ahhhh.' she mocked after she had drank. 'I'm slightly grateful that Trudy failed in killing you. It means we get to have the pleasure of doing it ourselves.'

Oh so the District 2 girl that I killed and who stabbed me was called Trudy. Who'd have known? I look over at the alcove and the third Career was still pilfering through mine and Elana's things and that ticked me off.

The girl looked at him and clicked her fingers.

'Casper! The District Six girl is here!'

He looked up and came over, holding Elana's knife and handed it over to Finbar.

'Well, Fin, Trudy was your fallen tribute. You can have the honours.' The girl and the Casper stood back, leaning against the rocks of the alcove.

Finbar put his hand to his chest in a cheesy film sort of way, like he had been struck through the heart with an arrow.

'You're too kind to me, Pippa.' his grin widened even more and he twisted the knife in his filthy hands. Suddenly, he lunged towards me.

I rolled on the floor and scorpion kicked him backwards in to the rocks, I heard him groan as his back contoured to the shape of the rock.

Pippa glared at me and I grinned back at her teasingly.

I saw a flash of silver fly by and the knife land behind me. Finbar was clearly not a good shot.

Running back, I grabbed it and ran to attack Fin, punching Casper across the jaw as he tried to intercept me, knocking him to the ground.

Pippa gave a singular nod to Finbar and both of them ran at me, I looked at the both of them, they were coming from different directions. I had to think on my feet and there was only one thing that I could think of that I could do. I dropped and rolled again, causing Pippa and Finbar to collide in to each other.

Just as I was about to get up, I was pulled up by a strong force, looking up, I saw the blond hair and bruised face of Casper. He stared me down, his green eyes piercing me, making me feel uncomfortable.

I was flung against the rocks and held there by my neck.

Finbar and Pippa had regained their composure and held down my legs and arms so I couldn't move.

I could hear them all laughing and taunting me. I felt a pressure on my neck and breathing started to become harder and harder, my body was ready to give up but my mind was not. I could feel myself slipping out of consciousness and now I was fighting against myself.

Something wet flew at my face and the grip on me was lessened, I dropped to the ground, coughing and spluttering.

I reached up to wipe the substance from me. When I looked at my fingers, they were covered in blood.

The last thing I remember seeing is Casper from District 1 lying on the floor with a large stab wound to the chest, blood coming from his mouth, Pippa and Finbar both looking horrified and Elana standing, out of breath, with a blood covered knife in hand and then there was black.


	3. Dreaming of the past

_I actually felt rather emotional writing this chapter. I cried at one point. Oh dear. Nevermind! Enjoy nonetheless and don't forget to R&R!_  
><strong><em>-Bethany<em>**

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><p><em>'Sabella!'<em>

_I could hear her soft voice from outside where I was sat, lying on the make shift lawn that I had made at the front of our small shack-like house at the bottom of District Six._

_My mother and father were out working leaving me and my older sister alone for the day, like we usually were. Not that I minded, I love Maryana a lot and I know that without her, my life would be insanely boring and empty. She's not only my sister but my best friend too._

_When we were younger, we used to sit together and make up stories together, mainly so that she could comfort me before it was time for bed in case I had a nightmare about being brutally murdered in the Games. Which was sad because I was only six at the time and wasn't eligible for the Games yet._

_Remembering those times made me smile, they were simple and we didn't fully understand the terror of the Capitol just yet. We heard things about it from people in conversations but we couldn't piece them together to build up the horrifying picture. I missed those times, a lot and I could never fully understand why I had these nightmares._

_Maryana and I look a lot a like, we've both got long dark hair, hers is usually kept in a messy bun at the back of her head, occasionally strands becoming loose, making her look like a worn out mother whilst my hair was usually kept down. We both have petite faces and build, we've both got almond shaped, hazel eyes. The only real obvious differences is the freckles that covered Maryana's face and the way I looked very young in comparison. I had a baby face and she had a mature one._

_I got up off of the ground and plucked a dainty daisy out of the earth. I carried it indoors with me, twisting the stem between my muddy thumb and index finger._

_'Sabella!' her voice called out again._

_I let out a small laugh and walked in to our tiny living room, Maryana laid across our battered sofa that was kindly donated to us years ago._

_'I'm right here, don't have a heart attack!' I laughed a bit harder and climbed on to the sofa with Maryana._

_She laughed with me as I laid my head on her chest, still twisting the daisy._

_'I got bored. It gets lonely sitting here, you know?' she told me, resting her chin on my head._

_My mouth turned slightly in to a sad smile and I slowly stopped spinning the daisy._

_'I can imagine.' I sighed. 'Sorry.' I mumbled, holding her close, even though I knew she wouldn't feel it._

_I felt her chest move as she let out a half laugh, half sigh._

_'It's okay, Bells.' I grimaced as she called me that, she saw and chuckled lightly. 'I don't mind if you go out. I wouldn't want you stuck in here too.' she told me._

_Maryana kissed the top of my head and I smiled. I looked at the daisy and got up off of the sofa, I placed it down on the table carefully. Then I gently pulled out the band that held my sisters hair in place._

_'What are you doing?' she asked, lifting her head back to see me, making her hair dangle over the edge of the sofa._

_I picked up her wooden hair brush from the table and began brushing through her hair._

_'Making you look even more beautiful than you already are.'_

_She smiled and lifted her head back up._

_I carried on brushing it through until it was completely untangled. Looking over at the daisy, I had an idea. I dashed back outside, picking more of the flowers out of the mud and grass and carrying them inside, lying them next to the original daisy._

_Using my hands, I gently put Maryana's hair up in her usual bun style, purposefully leaving it fairly messy. I left a few strands free at the front by her face, to frame it. Finally, I picked up a daisy and thread it through her hair and did this multiple times until her bun was decorated with a spiral of daisies._

_'There.' I said, stepping back and looking at it. 'Absolutely beautiful, just like you.' I could feel tears stinging in my eyes, I wiped my eyes quickly so Maryana couldn't tell I was crying but unfortunately, a sniffle gave the game away._

_She turned her head round as far as she could to try and see me._

_'Bells, come 'ere.' she said sadly. I walked over and laid back on the sofa with her, wrapping my arms around her shoulders and weeping._

_Maryana tried to calm me down, kissing me on the forehead and telling me everything was okay._

_'If I could hug you tight, I would. You know that.' she said, a hint of sadness and worry present in her speech, even though I could tell she was trying to hide it with a strong and unbreakable tone._

_I nodded and wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. Even though I was too young to remember and I had always known Maryana this way, it didn't effect the way I felt about her situation._

_Whenever I asked mum or dad when I was little, 'Why can't Maryana move?' they just told me that she was in an accident and that's what I grew up to know. It's all I've ever known about it. That's just what I accepted._

_I thought that asking her directly would be rude. Now that I'm older, I understand that she was in an accident that damaged her spinal chord when she was very young, hence why I don't know much about it, I was even younger. Now she's paralysed from the neck down._

_She's never been able to hug me when I'm sad and when she's sad and I hug her, she's never been able to feel it. However, she knew that she was being hugged because she could see it. She'd often pretend that she could feel it though, or say she can remember what a hug feels like and she's imagining it or that she can feel a numb sensation that told her she was being hugged. I didn't have the heart to tell her that I knew she was lying._

_'I know...' I muttered and then laughed nervously, looking at my sister. 'I think I should do your hair like that for the Reaping tomorrow. It suits you.' I sniffed, wiping the remaining tears from eyes._

_Maryana nodded and smiled._

_'That's my girl.' she said as I began to regain my composure. 'I would love you to do that. Thank you.'_

_That's one of the many beautiful things about Maryana, she doesn't want to let her paralysis get her down or me down or anyone else down. It's just something that happened to her that she's learned to deal with and she won't let it stop her from doing what she wants, like getting married to her fiancé, Aleksander._

_Almost on queue Aleks walked in holding a bunch of flowers and beamed across at Maryana._

_'Hello there, beautiful!' he chuckled, walking over and placing a kiss gently on her lips and then hugging me._

_Maryana stared at the flowers in his hand._

_'Those are lovely!' she cried out, her smile covering her face._

_Aleks looked at them and back at his bride to be._

_'Only the best for my girl!' he laughed, stroking her cheek._

_I couldn't help but look at them too. They were lovely, they were fantastically gorgeous. There were all sorts of colours in them, blues, reds, purples. They looked oddly out of place in our dreary house._

_'They must have cost a fortune!' I couldn't help but cry out as Maryana did. Aleks shrugged and told us that it was worth the money. He walked out and found a pot to put them in and placed the pot on the table so Maryana could always see them._

_Aleks and I both pretended not to see Maryana start tearing up. We both just cuddled up on the small sofa with her._

_He smiled and played with the few strands of hair that were framing her freckled face._

_'You should wear your hair like that at our wedding. It suits you. You look jusy like a princess.' his voice was calming and Maryana often told me that it made her feel safe._

_She agreed to it and asked us both how many times our names were going to be at the reaping tomorrow._

_I sighed and gave her my grand total of thirty two. Aleks had his name in there thirty eight times. It didn't look good for either of us._

_I'm only sixteen and Aleks was eighteen. If he escaped tomorrow without being picked, he'd never have to worry about it again. He could live his life with Maryana like he wants to. Maryana is nineteen and was exempt from the Games. Even the Capitol knew that it's unfair to put someone who was paralysed from the neck down in the arena._

_When we awoke on the morning of the day we were all dreading, it was very early. It was hard for any of us to sleep at all any way._

_I sat and brushed through and placed the flowers back in Maryana's hair in silence and helped her in to one of her favourite white dresses before getting changed in to my own beige coloured dress. I left my hair down, hanging off my shoulders._

_My mother and father gushed over us both, the both of them dressed in their best clothes too._

_The next hours flew by in a whirl and before I knew it, me, mum, dad and Aleks were all helping to carry Maryana to the square like we did every year._

_One we were there, Maryana kissed both me and Aleks, told us that she loved us and wished us luck before mum and dad took her and stood with the other parents and family members too old to take part._

_Me and Aleksander bravely walked over to where we should be standing and a few minutes later, it was time for the Reaping to begin._

_Everything our escort said was blurry and I could barely hear what was being said. My head was filled with too many terrifying thoughts. The thing that made me stand and listen properly was my name being called out through the speakers._

_No no no no no! Not me! It's not supposed to be me!_

_I walked up to the stage slowly and stood there, ignoring what was being said by our colourful Escort._

_My eyes went straight to Maryana who was incredibly distraught. However, I was not prepared for what was to happen next. I don't think any one was._

_The Escort crossed the stage to pick the male tribute and he read the name out clearly._

_'Aleksander Liberato!'_

_Maryana let out a loud cry. It almost sounded like a scream. I just wanted to run to her and hold her and I'm sure Aleks wanted to as well, as he greeted me on stage, he too looking for Maryana in the crowd. Her sobs were so loud and so heartbreaking, I had trouble not breaking down on stag, it was damn near impossible._

_My sister was going to either lose her little sister or her fiancée or maybe even both and I could still hear her loud painful cries from the crowd. No one was going to suffer more about it than she was..._

I woke startled and looked around. I was back in the arena with Elana, I was apparently crying and I remembered my dream.

'How long was I out? What happened?' I asked, sitting upright and looking around at my surrounding.

Elana smiled at me, she looked better than I remembered before I passed out.

'About a day or two. You were in danger so I helped you.' she explained, shrugging and handing me a bottle of water.

I drank from it deeply, not realising how thirsty I actually was until the water had passed my lips.

My ally took the bottle off me quickly and put it away, trying to save me from drinking it all.

'You look so much better.' I told her, inspecting her closely.

She grinned.

'I feel better. I got more medicine and cold water from my sponsors and I feel great. I think it was the stunt I pulled with Casper that got it for me.' she shrugged once more and handed me some snake meat.

We didn't have any of that when I passed out. She must be well enough to hunt now too. Which is great in a way. We could both collect food when we needed it but now that she was healthier than before, It'll be even harder for me to kill her.

I ate as slowly as I could, trying to savour it, but I was so hungry, I couldn't help but shovel it in to my mouth.

Lana shook her head.

'You look terrible. What were you dreaming about? You screamed a lot.' she asked, she sounded concerned, like she really cared.

The dream flashed back in my head and so did Aleks's death. His hand reaching for me at the end of it all.

Suddenly it hit me, Aleksander was gone and Maryana saw it on live television. She wasn't going to get her fairytale wedding and I was all she had left. It felt like the weight of the world came crashing down on me as this realisation came to be.

I remembered why I was so driven to win. Maryana needed me now more than ever and I was not going to leave her alone on that battered sofa, in that dreadful little shack house. Not again.


	4. Mary's little lambs

_This is the shortest chapter so far and it's not great, I'm aware, however, now that school has started up again and I start taking my final GCSE's in under a month, I don't think fic writing is my number one priority at the moment._  
><em><strong>-Bethany<strong>_

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><p>Maryana always used to say that we were all just lambs raised for the slaughter. Every last one of us. Every girl, boy, woman and man raised and born in every single district, that was to be the future of every little baby that is born to the happy, starving and dying families. That was one of the reasons she didn't want kids, that and pregnancy and labour would have been extremely difficult for her. She didn't want to watch her son or daughter grow up to be a lamb, trying to struggle out of the harsh, tight grip of the hungry farmer. She was never going to put a defenceless child in that danger. She's right of course, why make your children suffer the way you have? Where's the fairness in that? Making a little girl or boy terrified that they were going to have to fight and die in an arena on live television at just the age of eleven with no choice in the matter? No. It was never an option for my sister.<p>

I have to agree with her view. If I ever had a child, I wouldn't want to watch them starve and get brutally murdered on the TV.

I lay awake that night, looking up at the fake sky of the arena. It was almost completely black, some swirls of blue were there if you looked closely, and then something caught my eye and it made me smile. There in the middle of the night sky was a small sparkling star that seemed to pierce the darkness, giving the sky the tiniest bit of light.

To me that was a small vision of hope. It was dark times of course, for all of us. That singular star seemed to me to be the start of hope. Hope in the darkest of times. I suppose that it gave me even more strength to get up, fight and kill so I could go home.

I sat up, trying to make as little noise as I possibly could and started to think about how many people were left before I could go back to my little shack house, take Maryana, take my parents and give them a better life in Victor's Village.

There was my ally, Pippa and Finbar, who are probably pretty annoyed that I'm still alive, the boy from five and both tributes from ten.

Come to think of it, I haven't seen the boys from five and ten or the girl from ten either since the start of the games at the Cornucopia, all three of them just ran off I different directions as far away from the golden horn as they possibly could.

Elana was still fast asleep; she probably didn't get much sleep when I was unconscious because apparently she was up trying to protect me from the Careers if they came back or if by some miracle, the other three tributes reappeared out of the blue. At the moment, it's like they've completely vanished from the arena.

However, I'm not tired at all from the few days' sleep I got after nearly being choked to death by Casper. I guess now it was my turn to keep a look out for the other predators. My small ally looks quite sweet when she's asleep; you almost seem to forget that she has murdered so many of the other tributes and had so much blood on her hands.

A small sigh escaped my dry lips, I missed home more and more each day and I could do nothing about it but kill. Kill, kill and kill again. Over and over until you're just standing on top of a mound of festering, bloody bodies.

That idea made me feel so physically sick that I had to quickly get and up and vomit somewhere away from our camp. Now that Elana's health had started to pick up, mine own had begun to deteriorate.

The sun had started to rise over our desert and my little speck of hope in the sky had faded. I knelt down by our camp and started packing our things up so that if Lana woke, we could get up and leave before anyone found us.

Elana stirred in her sleep, mumbling to herself about goodness knows what. I couldn't help but smile though.

'Run!' she muttered. 'I told you to run!' she bolted up right and held her head in her hands, she breathed deeply for a minute.

I gently reached out to her rubbed her back, trying to comfort her. I probably wasn't doing a very good job, comforting people has never been a special talent of mine.

She lifted her head back up and grinned at me, but it wasn't a happy grin. It was clearly fake, it was the grin of a girl who was breaking from the inside, out. It was the grin of the broken girl trying to look strong for the cameras. I admire that.

My ally- nay, my friend got up and picked a backpack, slinging it over her shoulders.

'Are we going?' she asked me, nodding towards the smaller remaining back pack on the ground.

I gently nodded and gripped on to the back pack.

'You should carry this one. I'll carry the other one. I can't have you collapsing on me from too much strain.' Elana opened her mouth to speak but I placed my finger on her lips to stop her from protesting. 'No matter how many times you tell me that you're better, we don't know that for sure.'

In time she took off the larger back pack reluctantly and handed it to me in exchange for the smaller one.

We headed off in to the distance, unsure of where we were going and in what direction we were parting to.

It felt like we had walked for hours, it was a good job that both Elana and I had taken turns in going to collect water, otherwise we certainly we wouldn't have enough.

Sometimes a scorpion or a snake would go by and we'd kill it and put it away for later.

We talked about nothing in particular but everything we could think of. One thing we did keep clear of though was discussions about family and friends. That was too personal. Then again, telling each other our detailed secrets about our families and ourselves wouldn't really matter as one of us, or both, will end up dead any way.

It was around four o'clock in the afternoon when the air started to get colder, which was nice because the sweltering heat was starting to become too much to bear.

'It's getting a bit too chilly...' Elana piped up, looking around at her surroundings, a hint of worry in her usually stable voice.

I agreed with her and carried on walking along slowly, paying close attention to the distance. Elana hadn't noticed my reduction in pace and carried on walking at her normal step, she turned to talk to me but realised I wasn't there and backtracked a little.

She grabbed my hand and pulled me forwards.

'Come on, slow poke!' she said, giggly lightly.

I pulled my hand away from her.

'Wait.' I looked to my right, the wind violently blowing my hair backwards. 'Run.' I told her. My feet seemed like they were glued to the sand.

The other girl looked at me like I was mad and asked me why. In response, I just pointed to the giant cloud of dust that was rushing towards us, the wind going by faster, our hair blowing past our faces and blinding us.

Before we knew it, we were running with the wind and the sandstorm ever running behind us. It was difficult to see where we were going and we were running from our deaths.

I don't think either of us want to die from asphyxiation through the medium of sand. Or asphyxiation from anything for that matter.

We ran until my legs were sore, the wound in my abdomen felt like it was tearing open. I was half expecting my intestines or stomach to fall out.

I wasn't the only one struggling, Elana was starting to fall behind, almost being engulfed by the dust. In a moment of complete madness, I ran back to her and picked her up and ran back out and I never dared stop. I mustn't die. I mustn't die. Not now. Not like this. It felt like I was going to be running forever.

I didn't even stop when I felt a tugging on my shirt and my name being shouted down my ear, the feelings and the words weren't be processed in my head, like they almost didn't exist and I just kept going.

'Stop!' the voice cried out loudly.

This time, it did process and I slowed to a stop, dropping Elana on to the floor.

I doubled over panting and coughing, I looked up to see that the dust cloud was gone, so was the wind and so was the cold air.

Elana got up off the floor, wiping the sand from her body. She stood there, looking out and went as still as a stone statue.

'What's wrong?' I coughed, some sand coming out of my mouth and landing in my hand that covered my mouth.

She didn't answer, she just pulled me off the floor and made me stand facing the way she was.

Looking up, I saw the golden glint of Cornucopia and there was a sinking feeling in my chest.

I paused for a moment, even my breathing seemed to pause.

'Oh no..' I uttered. It took my eyes a while to focus in on how close we were to the Cornucopia.

'Oh yes.' came a familiar voice from over the top of me. I looked up, finding Pippa and Finbar both lying down on the top of the Golden horn, looking down at us both.

Pippa laughed and tapped her fingers on the metal she lying on top of.

'So we've got Six and Eleven down here and we've got Ten and Five in here.' she knocked on the side of the horn and from inside I heard people jump and squeak. Not expecting the loud bang from the outside.

They knew. The Capitol knew we were walking astray and they led us right to the Careers. The Capitol took us by the hand and walked us straight to the slaughter house because we are the lambs.

Even Finbar and Pippa are just small, innocent lambs, they don't even even realise how deadly this slaughter house is going to be because to them, it was a place of shelter and food.

I needed to get away from Pippa. She's a vile little girl. I could have just run away from the Cornucopia completely but the Capitol had worked so hard to bring me and Elana here, I didn't see the point in just leaving. They wanted a good show, so that's what I'm going to give them.

Instead of running, I just walked straight in to the horn, finding the other three tributes inside. The girl and boy from ten one one side, the boy from five on the other. When I entered, all three of them stood poised, holding on to their weapons. One with a hatchet, another with a small sword and the last with a spear.

'Is that how you welcome all of your guests?' I asked, holding my hands up in a weak defence attempt. I lowered my voice to a loud whisper. 'Now, lower your weapons. I'm not here to hurt any of you.' They hesitated and looked at each other, slowly lowering their arms.

I smiled and nodded.

'Thank you. Wait here...not that you're going any where.' I walked out and signalled to Elana, who was in the middle of a conversation with Finbar, to come inside the Cornucopia. The sun had started to set and the darkness was beginning to descend once more upon us all. In the distance, if I looked close enough, I could see my little beacon of hope starting to reappear in the sky. This was perfectly timed in my opinion.

Elana walked in and sat down, unsure of what was going on.

One of the boys piped up finally, holding up his spear again.

'And how can we trust you? Why shouldn't we just kill you now?' he asked in hostile tone.

A small laugh leapt from my dry throat.

'For the same reason you trust each other, the same reason Pippa and Finbar trust each other and for the same reason that Elana and I trust each other. Of course, secretly, we don't trust each other at all. After all, only one of us is getting out alive at the end of this.'

He dropped his spear down again.

'What do you want?' he asked, now a lot less hostile.

I grinned widly, Elana looking as confused as the other three.

'I have a proposition for you.'


	5. Battle Scars

_I'm sorry this chapter took so long to upload. I've been fairly busy and I should really be doing an English Literature essay right about now for a start. Oops. Enjoy and R&R as always!_  
><em>-<strong>Bethany<strong>_

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><p>The boy with the blood stained spear, held up his weapon once more, the other two tributes crowded around him, almost wanting to protect him from some great threat.<p>

'What kind of proposition?' he asked me, moving his spear closer towards me and Elana.

I smiled and sat down, picking up an orange that had rolled out of one of the supply bags that was knocked whilst the three of them assembled.

I peeled the skin away from the small fruit and threw the rubbery orange peel in to a nearby bag. Before I could eat a segment, the spear flashed before my eyes and pierced the orange, narrowly missing my hands.

Looking up, I saw the boy holding his spear so the head was pointing up, the orange skewered on the end.

'That's ours.' He said sternly, plucking it off the spike and sharing it out between himself and his two allies. 'Now, what is the proposition?' he asked me once more with a mouth full of fleshy fruit which made him spit slightly as he spoke.

My face turned in to a frown as I wiped away his saliva from my cheek.

'You three can alliance with Elana and I. This way it'll be easier to wipe out Finbar and Pippa. It'll be five against two.'

He scoffed and swallowed his mouthful, twisting his spear around so it was pointing at us again before he broke out in to laughter.

'No way. You've got to be kidding. That alliance is a death sentence.' His friends with the hatchet and the sword nodded, agreeing with the obvious leader of the small pack.

I shook my head.

'Wrong!' I cried, grinning and looking at all three of them in the eye in turn. 'This game is a death sentence. Therefore, you're already on death row. It's not going to make much difference any way. You have nothing to lose.'

The little girl from five piped up, lowering the hatchet to her side.

'Apart from our lives.' She pointed out.

Elana chuckled behind me quietly; I turned and smiled at her, knowing that she was thinking the exact same thing as I was.

I got up off the floor and walked over to the girl that had spoken, tucking some stray hair behind her ear like I used to do for Maryana.

'We're all going to lose our lives any way, my dear.' I told her softly, resting my hand gently on her shoulder which made her wince ever so slightly. 'Only one of us is going to get out. You've got a one in seven chance. The odds don't look very in your favour, do they?'

She shook my hand away from her and stepped backwards. I smiled apologetically as it was true. The odds weren't in any one's favour right now.

'Jackson, get them out.' She quietly said, cowering back away behind some boxes and biting her thumb. 'GET THEM OUT!' she screamed.

Her screaming triggered more banging against the Cornucopia from the Careers, along with a few jeers and taunts too.

The boy with the spear, who would appear to be Jackson, came towards Elana and I with his spear. Lana bounced on to her feet and we were both edged out of the Cornucopia. Whilst leaving, I noticed that the male tribute from District Ten had gone over to where the girl was crouched, he looked like he was trying to console her.

With one final push, we were back outside in the dark, Pippa and Finbar just above our heads and a spear pointed at our chests.

'We decline your alliance offer.' He spat at us both and walked back inside the Cornucopia to his little friends.

Rolling my eyes, I stormed back in, breaking free of the grip that Elana had on me to stop me from doing something that I was sure to regret doing later.

'Bella, no! Don't bother with them, just let them die.' Lana called back after me, before giving in and following me back in to the golden horn.

The three of them turned around in unison but before they could do anything to help him, I punched Jackson across the face so hard, his head turned around and he fell on to the metal floor, presumably near to unconsciousness.

I flexed my hand out slightly, blood coming from the cuts that I had made in my knuckles from punching him so hard.

'I dare you to spit on me again.' I growled, spitting on the back of his head in return. Elana was still trying to pull me away from the Cornucopia but with little success seeing as she was still regaining her strength.

The crazed shouting girl shot up and lunged at me, holding her hatchet.

'Get out before I rip open your stomach and pull your guts out through the hole whilst I get Aiden and Jackson told hold you down and watch me do so.'

I sniggered and lifted up my shirt, showing her the wound that was healing in my abdomen.

'Trudy already started that one, dear and where is she now? Oh yeah, she's dead. I killed her!' I started laughing, lowering my shirt back over my blood stained stomach. 'I gave her head trauma and she bled out from the inside. I suggest that you keep a look out for me from now on. You can thank Jackson over there for that one.' I pointed over to the boy who was scrabbling up slowly from the ground, a fist shaped red mark on his face.

She looked back at him and then at me, her eyes almost seemed full of fire. I could tell she was about to attack me for taunting her, I got on the balls of my feet, ready to run but Aiden, the boy from ten, held the girl by her arm and pulled her backwards.

'Evelina, go and attend to Jackson. He's going to need you. '

Evelina nodded and walked away silently, guiding Jackson to the back of the Cornucopia and sat him down, she pulled out a tattered rag from her bag and soaked it in a bottle of water. She wrung it out and carefully placed it on to Jackson's cheek to reduce any swelling that I might have caused from my brilliant right hook.

'You're going to pay for that, Six!' Jackson called out to me as he tended to by this odd girl. He acted incredibly gentle towards her, like she was something fragile.

Aiden held up his hand to him and sighed.

'I'll deal with it. You don't want to make a fool of yourself on national TV for being beaten up by a girl. Twice. Do you?' he laughed and swung his sword in front of me, I felt a pull on my shirt and I fell backwards. Elana shook her head at me and kicked Aiden in the stomach.

'Go!' she said to me, kicking him down again, giving me enough time to get up and run for safety. I obeyed and ran out of the mouth of the Cornucopia but I was stopped in my tracks by Pippa and Finbar who had heard the racket coming from inside and climbed off the top of the horn, ready to join the fray.

Pippa shook her head and tutted.

'You're not very good at making friends, are you, Caverly?'

Finbar poked me in the abdomen, causing immense pain surge through me from my wound and I doubled over.

'I wish Trudy had finished the job sometimes. However, no offense to her, I wouldn't have gotten so close to Pippa over here. At least something came out of her death. I can also kill you myself. That's another great plus.'

I smiled innocently and tried to walk around the pair.

'Well, I'm very happy for you. Good luck with your future.'

A hand reached out to stop me from walking around and I was thrown back to my original position in front of them.

Finbar shook his head.

'And where do you think you're going?' he asked me, folding his arms across his chest, waiting and expecting an answer.

I pointed behind them, weakly.

'Over there...' My sentence was interrupted by a scream coming from the Cornucopia.

My heart felt like it had dropped in to my stomach and I ran back towards the horn.

'Elana!' I shouted but before I even knew I had, I was pinned to the ground and I couldn't get up again.

'Just let her die!' came a voice that sounded a few inches away from my face. I struggled once more to get free of the hold but couldn't. The force weighing me down to the sandy floor was too strong.

'ELANA!' I screamed her name again, panicking and terrified.

Suddenly, I was unable to shout as something was covering my mouth, and I could only make muffled sounds.

I could feel tears pricking in my eyes but I was trying to hard not to cry. Then I remembered my star and I looked up to see it and I closed my eyes.

With as much force as I could muster, I pushed the weight off of me and sent Finbar backwards on to the sand.

I got up and kicked Pippa in the stomach so that both of the Careers were momentarily disorientated so that I could run back in to the Cornucopia and get to Elana.

Once I was there, Evelina, Aiden and Jackson were all crowding around my helpless ally and as far as I could see, they were torturing her somewhat.

Before I could even attack them, Pippa and Finbar stormed in, ready for action. They tore the three of them away from each other, Pippa taking on Evelina, Finbar taking Jackson, leaving Aiden alone to attack Elana.

I picked up a crate box that was lying around inside and whacked him across the head with it, knocking him the the ground.

I extended my arm out to Elana and she grabbed it and I pulled her up on to her feet. Her face was covered in blood and looked like it had taken a beating. Her once pretty, innocent face looked worn and battered and she looked almost sinister.

'Are you okay?' I asked her, wiping some blood from her face with my hand.

She nodded and gently flicked my hand away from her.

A choking noise made us all turn and a distraught voice soon followed. If I were watching this from the safety of my home, my heart would have broken.

Pippa had pulled Evelina's head backwards by her hair and slit her throat slowly. You could see the pain etched on to the girls dying face still and even her last tear rolling down her cheek.

Jackson was screaming out her name as the canon fired and Pippa let Evelina's lifeless body drop and giggled as it did so.

Finbar rolled his eyes and stole the small sword from Aiden's hands and hacked away at Jackson's right arm with it until it fell off completely, he was screaming and bleeding profusely.

'Will you be quiet?' he asked him. Finbar leaned towards Jackson's ear and whispered. 'She was going to die any way. No happily ever after for you.'

Those six last words rang through my head, followed by Aleksander's brutal death. I could feel immense anger running through me. I pulled out a small knife that I had acquired earlier on in the games that I kept well hidden.

'There isn't going to be one for you either.' I ran at Pippa and tried to attack her but she was fast and I could only just manage to make a deep cut in her thigh, that slowed her down a bit.

Elana screamed again and I could hear a horrible loud snap.

Finbar had twisted Elana's arm back so far that he'd snapped it, leaving her arm horribly twisted and incredibly painful yet she tried to keep a strong composure, like she always did.

Her attacker grinned widely and shoved me out of the way so I crawled over to Elana to help her. He went over and picked up Pippa from the ground and he glared at Elana, Aiden, Jackson and I.

'We'll be back for you. I promise you.' then he ran out of the horn with the girl wrapped around him, clearly trying to free herself from him to be part of the action.

Jackson legged it out too, he couldn't fight with one arm at the moment due to his blood loss.

This just left Aiden and I, Elana was not going to fight. No way.

We almost immediately went at each other, kicks and punches were thrown among other things as well.

I managed to stab him in the side, just above his hip, it didn't cause much damage at all and he basically laughed it off.

He threw me against the hard metal and took the knife out of my hands. He lifted my shirt and he reopened the wound in my abdomen quickly and dropped me back down.

Aiden then tapped me on the head with the knife and smiled gently.

'I would stay to kill you but I've got a plan and me killing you both, is not part of that plan.' he shrugged and tucked the knife away and picked up a supplies bag and ran out, leaving me alone with Elana, Evelina's dead body and Jackson's arm.

I looked down at my wound and noticed the bleeding and then I noticed how he'd made the wound bigger as well.

I cursed under my breath and took off the sleeve from Jackson's arm and pressed it against the wound, hoping it would stick to the blood and somewhat slow the blood flow a bit before going over to Elana to try and straighten out her arm a little.

'Three...two...' I twisted her arm out straight, trying to realign the bone. She screamed again and I tried to console her once more.

'It's okay...shhh, don't make a fuss. We'll make you something to keep it straight later, I promise. Just try not to move it for now, yeah?'

She nodded and I hugged her gently, accidentally getting blood on her. Lana couldn't help but burst in to tears so I hugged her tighter and kissed her forehead gently.

'You'll be okay...You're safe for now.'

I held her close to me as she cried on my shoulder, I rocked her and told her stories to calm her down but eventually she had managed to silently cry herself to sleep.


	6. The calm after the storm

_The next few chapters are probably going to be a while, I'm sorry. However enjoy and R&R!_  
><em><strong>~Bethany<strong>_

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><p>I could barely sleep that night, I was in so much pain and I had so many thoughts swimming through my mind, they would not let me rest whilst Elana slept peacefully. Her arm was quickly beginning to bruise and her eyes red and swollen from crying.<p>

The Cornucopia gave us some shelter from the cold winds that were gently blowing against the metal horn. It had been a long time since the face of Evelina was projected in to the night sky, either that or time had gone so slowly that I didn't even have a correct sense of time. For all I know, it might have been only five minutes since her small, pointed face was shown to us.

There was blood seeping through my shirt and I was probably close to blacking out, from blood loss or exhaustion, I wasn't sure of that but something made me start muttering prayers under my breath. I wasn't particularly religious, I never had been but if I was dying right now, it was better to be safe than sorry, I don't want to go to Hell for murder because I was forced to do it. Well, I suppose I wasn't. I could've chosen to let someone kill me at the blood bath at the beginning of the Games.

I felt helpless and lost and I wanted some relief, even if that was in the God that I did not believe in, I wasn't going to get it from anything else or anyone else.

'Please lord, let me live. Let me live. I have to live…please, please, please…'

That was when I saw it, something silver outside the mouth of the Cornucopia, something large and silver. My mouth upturned in to a huge grin and I gently loved Elana so that I could crawl out towards it.

I opened up the gift from the sponsors finding bandages and anti-septic cream. It took everything in me not to scream out in sheer joy and delight. I picked up one of our bottles of water and used it to clean out my wound, clearing the fresh, congealed and dried blood, leaving relatively clean and open. The anti-septic smelled awful but helped the wound a lot and made it feel so much better than what it was when it was oozing with some of my bodily fluids.

I wrapped the bandage around me and tied it tightly so it stayed where I wanted it to.

Maybe there is a God after all, I don't know. Maybe it was just awfully good luck. Either way, I was eternally grateful to whatever force it was that gave me this chance at life.

I lay quietly on the Cornucopia base, hoping to be able to catch some form of sleep; no matter how little of it, I'll take what I can get.

Sadly, as I was just getting comfortable; the sound of the canon made me jump and bolt upright. I checked Elana's pulse; her heart was still beating and she was still very much alive.

It must have been Jackson who had died. His arm was cut off completely and it was hacked away at roughly, he had no hope of surviving that, especially with the amount of blood that he had lost from that particular wound.

That left, Elana, Pippa, Finbar, Aiden and I. The final five. Pippa and Finbar were surely not to take any risks now; they wanted to win as much as I did. Even if they were to be the only two left at the end of it all, they would have to turn on each other because the Capitol needed a single victor. Their Romeo and Juliet love story was never really going to last very long and neither was Jackson's and Evelina's but I thought Maryana and Aleksander were never going to end. They were due to get married and he was going to be my big brother, someone who could look after me and hug me when I had nightmares about being slaughtered in some of the most violent ways that my brain could come up with at three o'clock in the morning, every morning. But that wasn't going to happen now and we're not due to become a big happy family like we all wanted. Tears pricked in my eyes and I wanted to cry, curl up and cry until I no longer could. I wanted someone to just hold me and tell me that everything was going to be okay as if this was all a bad dream and I'll wake up to find Maryana on her sofa laughing with Aleksander who sat on the floor next to her, holding on to her hand whilst I brushed through her hair.

But this was what was going on, I was in a battle where I had to kill or be killed and I didn't really want to do either of them, they were poor choices.

I had to hold in my emotions until I could go back to the safety and comfort of my own home.

Elana stirred next to me, whimpering slightly from the pain in her arm as she accidentally moves it in her sleep.

I tried to quieten her down, but it didn't work and she woke up.

She whispered across to me, her head resting on my shoulder, her arm limp and useless.

'Kill me, Bella…'

I lifted her away from my shoulder and looked her in the eye.

'Not at all.' I told her, shaking my head.

She frowned and nodded at me, juxtaposing my refusal of her request.

'I'm weak from heat stroke and this magic medicine I've been given isn't going to last forever and I'll get sick again, I'm limp and I can't help you, I'm just holding you back. Just do it quickly, snap my neck or something. I know you can do it, I know you can win.'

I continued to shake my head and I glared over at her.

'Don't you dare talk like that. You wouldn't want your family to hear you say that would you?'

She sniffed and wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand but gave me a weak laugh nonetheless.

'There is no family, Bella. I'm orphaned and alone.'

I looked at her in shock, my mouth hung open. If my mother were here, she would make me close my mouth; saying that I would start catching flies and Maryana would laugh and say that at least I'd be useful for something.

'But you said you had a brother…' I said quietly.

She grinned a grin that looked so bittersweet and she sniffed almost inaudibly.

'I do…did.'

I sat her upright, leaning her against the wall but she batted me away saying that she could do it herself and moved around by pushing herself along using her knees and unbroken arm. I sat opposite her and bit my lip.

'He died about three years ago.' Elana told me through a yawn.

I shuffled lightly and brought my knees up to my chest and held them there with my arms, my wound didn't hurt as much as it would have before the anti-septic.

'What from?' I hoped that I wasn't being too forward or rude or that it didn't look like I was trying to pry in to her personal life.

Elana laughed and rolled her eyes, looking highly amused which confused me greatly.

'This is the funny bit.' She laughed a bit more and threw her head back, leaning it against the metal, in line with her back. She brought it forward quickly and her smile faded ever so slightly. 'He died of heat stroke!'

She laughed loudly and hard but a bit sarcastically too.

I laughed out of awkwardness; I wasn't sure how I was supposed to respond to that one. Luckily, I didn't have to, Elana was about to give me something else to respond to.

'You love your sister, don't you?' she asked, her laughter had died down completely and she looked absolutely serious.

I nodded.

'More than anything in this world.'

She smiled and nodded with me.

'Exactly! That's how I felt about my brother. I thought that you would understand why I wanted to die so much. I have no hope any way and I just want to see my brother again.'

I moved closer to her and hugged her tightly, avoiding her broken arm again.

'You might want to see him but I doubt he'd want you to die to do that. Just make him proud and stay alive, yeah?'

She agreed reluctantly and I helped her to her feet, it was starting to get lighter now and I would just be able to see where I was going.

We gathered as much equipment, water and weaponry that we could carry and we headed out once more.

We walked and talked, laughed and tried not to cry. A while later, we came across a few trees, they would provide us with some shade but I had no idea where the nearest water supply was.

Elana perched underneath one of the small trees and regained her breath. I climbed the tree and broke off two smallish branches from it and dropped them on to the sand below next to my tired friend.

I jumped from the tree and landed on my feet, much like a cat. I sat beside her and got out some more bandages from the box that my sponsors had sent me earlier.

'This might hurt and I'm so sorry.' I gently lifted her broken arm and straightened it again; she winced and tried not to scream out. I placed the two branches on either side of her arm and got her to hold on to one of the branches with her good hand.

I took the remainder of the bandages and wrapped it tightly around both her arm and the branches and secured it tightly, hoping that it would just keep the bone in place.

'Thank you.' She replied, turning her pained expression in to one of gratitude. 'You've helped me so much. I need to repay you.'

I smiled.

'There's no need to do that. You saved my life, I'm repaying you!' I cried out quietly to her.

Elana shrugged gently and gave an odd smile, one that showed that she was missing a tooth near the back of her mouth.

'I did it because you're my friend.' She admitted.

I pretended not hear her because I felt guilty for planning to kill her. If I had killed her when I met her, I wouldn't be alive right now. I just unpacked and packed our things up so that if we needed to, we could fit more things in out bags.

'I think Jackson's dead.' I said finally. 'There are just five of us now.'

She nodded sombrely.

'Just five…' she said quietly.

It was a scary thought, four more were soon to die and that would leave us with the champion of the 62nd Annual Hunger Games.

I remembered what I had said to Evelina, that the odds weren't very in her favour. The truth is, the odds weren't really in my favour either. The odds were now just 1 in 5. I have a one fifth chance of going home and living through this entire ordeal.

I was almost certain that I was going to die; I had three enemies in this arena, possibly four. You never know what's really going on inside a person's head. The human mind is a very dangerous place where all sorts of thoughts and ideas lurk, waiting to come out.

'Five.' I confirmed.

Lana sighed heavily and chewed on her bottom lip nervously.

'It's so close to the end, isn't it? We're so close to getting what we want, aren't we?'

I nodded and patted on her back, a smile on my face, trying to mask the terror that was filling the both of us.

'Congratulations on making it to the final five!' I said to her.

She smiled meekly.

'But whenever we get any where close to what we want, the Capitol takes it away from us...' she trailed off and dropped her head.

I sighed quietly and rubbed her back, another bad attempt at making her feel a little bit better.

'Well, let's put it this way, we're in the final five, there were fourteen others who didn't make it thus far and I think, that makes us special. Don't you?' My mouth upturned in to a little smile as Elana lifted her head back up and wiped the tears from her eyes.

She nodded and rested her head on my shoulder.

'You're good at cheering people up.' She said to me quietly.

I laughed and stroked her hair gently, like I would have to Maryana.

'I learned from the best.'

My friend agreed with me and whispered in my ear.

'Congratulations on making it to the final five.'


	7. Goodnight and good luck

_Sorry about the wait! I've just finished my exams and I currently don't have a laptop to update a lot but I've been borrowing my brother's. Short chapter again, I'm sorry but this fic will be coming to an end shortly. Please enjoy and R&R!_  
><em><strong>~Bethany<strong>_

* * *

><p>The more I thought about, the more I believe that Aiden would be the next to go. During the last big fight, he told me that he had a plan. Somehow, I don't think his plan will work. I think that it has something to do with relying on the four of us, Finbar, Pippa, Elana and I, killing each other whilst he hid and waited. After all, he did say that killing us was not part of his plan. Of course, if this was his plan, it wasn't thought through very well. That sort of plan could easily go wrong, he might expect us to do one thing but, we do another. Thus, throwing his plan completely out of the window.<p>

Shakespeare once wrote, 'When beggars die, there are no comets seen; the heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes.'  
>Personally, I believe that this quote does fit our situation. When a person dies in the Districts, there is little fuss. We're all poor and weak and unknown. It's just our little community that mourns. When we die in the arena, when we've been brave and soldiered on, mainly because we have to, we're projected in to the sky and people in other districts know who we are, the Capitol knows who we are. We die as princes. That's a sad fact, we should be able to die as princes whether we compete in the Games or not. We're human beings with feelings and, even if it's just one person, we are important to someone and we are loved by someone.<p>

I like to think that I am important to Elana, after all, not many other tributes would have saved her life when she came asking for help. She would have been easy to kill. I was abruptly brought back to the world around me as my stomach made a loud growl. I had to go hunting. I hate this arena, there's very few animals that live in this sort of climate and surrounding to actually hunt and eat. It's a sort of thing where you get what you're given and you'll get on with it.

'Lana?' I whispered, rocking her gently. I had no idea what time it was, nor did I particularly care at this point.  
>She whined and turned to face me.<p>

'Wha-' she sat up carefully and rubbed her eyes with the arm that was fully in tact.  
>I smiled at her and her brief moment of innocence.<br>'No, it's okay. Stay there. I'm just going to go hunting, okay?'

She nodded and yawned an 'okay' back at me before setting down again to sleep. I picked up some hunting supplies and headed off to find food.  
>It felt like I had been walking for hours and I had found nothing. Sometimes I'd come across a scorpion but it always got the better of me.<br>I was about to give up and return back when something, or should I say, someone, caught my eye. Aiden was also hunting, as far as I could see. I looked around me and saw a rock, naturally, I leapt towards it and hid.

His pace slowed and he fell to his knees. He scooped up a handful of sand and began to eat it. Mouthful after mouthful, barely stopping to breathe. I did nothing but sit by and watch him, I couldn't look away for some reason. It didn't take long before he began to choke and splutter but even then, he kept going, shovelling more of the hot sand in to his mouth. The cycle kept going and I could just see his face turning purple in colour gradually. It took a while but eventually he collapsed, face first in to the sand. The canon sounded and I knew he had died.

It was such an unusual thing to have witnessed. My only guess is that he couldn't find any food and he got desperate and ended up choking. Some force stopped me from getting up and carry on hunting, I think I was too shell shocked by it.

I saw a shadow cast upon the rock that I was crouched by, I turned and I swear I stopped breathing for, I don't even know how long. But there it was, it wasn't the trick of the light, it wasn't an hallucination, it was real. It was a small Gazelle. Finally, something that would fill both Elana and I.

It did take a while for me to get close enough to kill it but I managed to. The difficult part was getting it back to Elana. My physical strength wasn't up to scratch and I was injured and I had no idea how far I had walked. When I did get back to Lana, she was up and the look on her face when she saw that Gazelle was great.

We cooked and ate and I told her what happened to Aiden. The fact there were only four of us left didn't come up in conversation, I think we were just trying to forget about it.

'Well, now that Aiden's dead, the Careers are certainly going to be after us now.' Elana said through bites of meat that were slightly undercooked.

I nodded and began to wrap up the rest of the meat to save for later.  
>'I know. I wouldn't be surprised if the victor is crowned in the next day or two.'<p>

'We better buckle up then.' She laughed and finished her portion of meat. She nudged me with her elbow. 'Cheer up.'

Cheer up? I don't even think I have to tell you what was wrong with that sentence.

'Yeah, yeah. I will.' I lied. I think Elana knew that I was lying but she understands why.

We decided to take our things and head back to the rock alcove where we met. I hadn't realised how far out we'd actually travelled. I also didn't realise how thirsty I was either. We still had a little water from just before the Capitol induced sand storm but we can stop for water once we reach our destination.

Once we did, it was already starting to get dark. We were just in time for the anthem to start playing and see Aiden's face get projected in to the fake sky.

Elana coughed, her head tilted upwards.  
>'I have a question.' she said calmly, not moving a muscle, as if she had turned to stone.<p>

'Shoot.' I responded, searching through our backpacks to find sleeping bags and anything else that would keep us warm, ignoring the temptation to drink as much water as I could.

She sighed, still looking up.  
>'Now that there's only four of us and a final battle is ensured. Do we go to them or let them find us?'<p>

I licked my lips and threw a bottle of water at Elana.  
>'Heads up.'<br>She moved again and caught the bottle with her unbroken arm. She placed the bottle in between her legs and unscrewed the cap, drank from it and replaced closed the lid before chucking it back at me.

I didn't manage to catch it and it slammed hard against the rocks, falling to the floor. There was a split second of silence before we both started laughing. The laughter died down and I picked the bottle up and drank from it, contemplating Elana's question.

'Well.' I began, putting the bottle away again and bringing out the sleeping bags. 'We can either create a defence plan here and let them come to us or, we can devise an attack plan and go to them.'

She considered both options and we decided to go with the defence plan.

'We could trick them in to thinking we're hiding over there.'

'We can pretend I just attacked you and whilst I'm attacking them, you get up and attack as well.'

'We could throw the club over the rocks and hope it hits one of them on the head and knocks them out.'

'Why don't we just let it play out without a plan? If we don't have a plan, it can't go wrong.'

'I like the last one.'

'Me too.'

Of course it could go wrong. For both alliances, both members of the other and one of their own has to die to end the games. It wasn't exactly a perfect scenario. Of course, it never was to begin with either.

'Now we wait.' Elana concluded, leaning back against the alcove wall.

'Now we wait.' was my confirmation. I was actually very nervous now and scared. Incredibly scared. I was soon to be staring death in the face and that's a horrible thought, I'm only sixteen, I couldn't die now but I knew, deep down, I was going to.

Somewhere between that moment and suddenly being slapped across the face, I had fallen asleep. I woke up with a stinging in my right cheek and Elana staring down at me.

'Ow...' I sat up and held me cheek. 'Why'd you slap me?' I asked, trying to rub the pain away.

'You wouldn't wake up.' my battered and bruised friend said to me quietly.

I furrowed my brow and yawned.  
>'You didn't have to slap me!'<p>

She raised her eyebrows and nodded.  
>'Yes actually. I did.'<p>

'Why?'

'Because we've got company.'

I peeked over the side of the rocks and she was right. In the distance I could see Finbar and Pippa in the far distance walking this way. I ducked down and gave Elana and apologetic smile.

'Sorry for yelling at you.'

'It's fine. We've got more important matters to see to right now though.' She reminded me, nodding her head in the Careers direction.

We gathered our weapons, ate our food so we had strength to fight, we drank, we prepared ourselves.

'Do you think this is our last fight?' Elana asked, zipping up one of the backpacks.

I shrugged.  
>'There's no way of telling but it could be.'<p>

I could see that they weren't that far away now and we had to work quickly.

Elana sighed heavily and turned to me.  
>'Do you think we should say our goodbye's now?' before I could even answer, she carried on talking. 'Actually, I don't care. I'm going to because this is probably it. Thank you, Bella. You've been a great friend, thank you for all the help you've given me over the past few weeks.'<p>

'Be quiet Elana. This might not be the end just yet. We still have time.' I gulped ans reached for her good hand and held it tightly. 'We've got time.' I whispered.

We stood there and watched the Careers come toward us, they looked like they were running now.

'I'm scared.' Elana gripped my hand tighter, her skin was tight and dry. I took a deep breath and laughed nervously.

'Me too.'

This was it. The Careers were upon us and they were both staring manically in to our terrified and worn out faces. Our hands stayed together but we knew that we had to let go.

Before we even knew what was happening, punches, kicks and weapons were being thrown around. Even we were being thrown about every now and then. For some reason, I couldn't find the energy to get up and defend myself as I was repeatedly punched around the face and in the abdomen.

Suddenly, it stopped and Elana flew past me, tackling Finbar to the ground. I sat up and tried to get to my feet but coughed up blood and collapsed on the sand instead. I could see Fin and Lana attack each other beside me but, I couldn't see Pippa. However, that might just be because my eye sight had gone blurry.

I wanted nothing more than to get up and help her but my body wouldn't let me. I felt like I had betrayed myself and Elana just because I couldn't move. It took me a while but I realised that I couldn't hear them fighting any more, just groans that weren't coming from me. Both of them were lying in pain on the floor, I could see them out of the corner of my eye.

A voice came from above, I assumed that it was Pippa seeing as she was the only one that was not writhing on the floor. There was a flash of silver and a giggle coming from her lips.

'Hmm...who do I rip apart first? You...' her stare lingered on me for a few seconds. 'Or you..' she looked over in Elana's direction and used her knife to scratch her chin.

'I think...I'll go for...you.' she grinned, she attacked, there was blood and I passed out.


	8. Homeward bound

_Hello! This is the last chapter and it's not very good, I'm very sorry about that. Try to enjoy anyway and R&R as always!_  
><em><strong>~Bethany<strong>_

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><p>Apparently, I was only unconscious for less than a minute, because as I came round, Pippa still had her knife stuck in the chest of her victim, which, to my surprise, turned out to be Finbar. His dark blond hair mixed with the sand, almost camouflaging it.<p>

'Pippa...Stop...' Finbar coughed weakly, trying to pull the knife from his chest, clasping his large rough hands around the females smaller, just as rough and dry hands. His dark blue eyes were wide with shock, tears began to spill over his bottom lids, and finally, they began to glaze over.  
>His hands started to slip off of the girls but before his heart decided to give up, he spat blood at her face and gave her a smug smile, showing his blood covered crooked teeth.<br>'I should've known...' he breathed heavily. 'That you were...a traitorous...tramp.'  
>The canon fired and Finbar's face still had his crooked smile printed upon on it. Pippa dislodged her knife from him and span it between her fingers before cleaning the blood of it with her shirt. At least now we know that Juliet didn't really love her Romeo. I didn't actually expect Pippa to be the one who would betray her ally, I thought Finbar might have but then again, Pippa was always the more furtive and tricky one of the pair.<p>

Finally, my instinct for survival kicked in and I was able to peel myself off of the sand and fight for my life. I used my bony arms to lift my torso up and propel me to my feet to help my friend. I ran to her with my hair billowing in the wind that barely existed.  
>'You can run, Caverly, but it won't help you!' Called the sickly sweet voice of the dark haired, pig nosed little girl. She didn't come running after us like I thought she would. Perhaps she wanted to drag this particular encounter out for as long as she could, well, it would give an interesting show.<br>I ignored her and extended a hand out to Elana who gripped it as tightly as her wasted hands could manage. I helped her to her feet and she smiled thankfully before guiding me over towards the backpacks that were ripped from our shoulders in the earlier fight.

'Now take these and kill her.' Lana pushed the bag of weapons towards me with her foot. She grinned happily and pointed towards the other female tribute. 'Go!'  
>I picked up my club and handed her the hatchet that we had taken after the death of Evelina.<p>

'And you're coming with me.' I told her sternly.  
>She shook her head violently, her hair whipping her neck, leaving light red marks against her dirty, light mocha coloured skin.<br>Elana frowned and threw it in to the sand.  
>'No!' she cried out.<p>

I rolled my eyes and gripped tightly on to my club and ran off towards Pippa. How could Elana be so stupid? Why was she refusing to fight? Unless that was part of her plan, for Pippa to kill me and then Pippa would be hers. She's good enough to do it; I know that she's killed far more than I have, in our time in the arena. That did scare me a bit when we first met, I was sure that she would kill me early on in our alliance. Instead, she was going to let someone else do it for her, so that she didn't look like the bad guy. Never mind, I'll see to her later, once I've finished off Pippa.  
>She stood by the alcove, leaning against it, waiting. She was waiting for me to approach her so that she could kill me, which, is fairly obvious as that is the point of the game.<p>

'Hi, Caverly!' Pippa cried, like we were friends who hadn't seen each other in a long time. She even waved and smiled.  
>'Goodwin.' I replied coldly, keeping that tight grip on my faithful club.<br>'Shall we skip the small talk and just get down to it?' she asked.  
>'That would be for the best.' I said, using my other hand to punch her across the face.<p>

She tried to duck but I managed to clip her tooth just in time, causing my skin to be ripped open on my knuckles. There wasn't much damage made on her though. What a shame.  
>Pippa laughed.<br>'Is that the best you've got?' she grinned manically.  
>'Nope. This is just the beginning.' I punched her again, this time, knocking out one of her teeth, which she spat back at me.<br>I was stabbed a few times, once in the arm, another in the leg and a final one was just a small cut on my side where I had moved out of the way as she tried to stab my lung out. I used the stab-free leg to kick her so far backwards that she flew in to some rock and I heard her back crack. We fought for over an hour, neither of us sustaining any real life threatening injury, as of yet.  
>I punched her again but this time, in the stomach, so that she was winded.<br>Pippa bounced back quickly, to my surprise, by kicking me in the stomach, (probably to get back at me for winding her) to be more precise, in my open wound. I fell back in to the sand, and suddenly Pippa was on me again, punching me repeatedly across the face and choking me, my club had rolled away when she knocked me over. I tried to reach it as it was only a few centimetres away but I couldn't reach it. Pippa fell backwards and I was able to get back up, I was momentarily confused until I saw Elana, holding the club and the unconscious girl at her feet.

'All girls together, eh?' Elana grinned, chucking the club over to me. I caught it and nodded.

'Thank you.' I replied, getting back up. 'What now? Do we kill her?' I asked.

Elana pondered over it for a moment and shrugged.  
>'I don't know. Why not just have a bit of fun like she was having with the rest of them?'<p>

'You make a valid point, Elana. I knew there was a reason I liked you.'  
>Her smiled was huge after I said that, it was bigger than I had ever seen it before, she almost looked younger and far more energetic than she had done beforehand.<br>There was a painful moan and Pippa stammered back up. I sighed and whacked her over the back of the head so she collapsed back on the sand.

'I think I could do this all day.' I laughed.  
>We left Pippa alone for a moment to go and get our bags but when we returned, she had gone.<p>

'Well, she couldn't have gone far.' Elana said, gripping the backpack and looking around the area.  
>'No. She couldn't. That's the problem. She couldn't have because we're here. She's hiding somewhere to attack.' I whispered, scouring the arena with my eyes. 'Be quiet, keep a look out and stay low. Watch out for rocks though, they're easy to hide behind.' I warned.<p>

We crouched down and crept around, trying to keep an eye out so that we could attack her before she could attack us. Sadly, that didn't go to plan. Elana was dragged away from me by the sly, short little girl that we were hunting.  
>'Elana!' I got up and chased after her; as Pippa continued to drag my friend away. She grabbed her hair and held it around her hand as she bashed Elana's head against the alcove, again and again. The blood from her head was staining the rock with a dark red colour.<p>

I hit Pippa once more across the head and this time, I did it repeatedly, as she had done to Elana (who was now lying on the ground in a pile of blood coming from her head).  
>'At least...I managed to...kill your friend...' Pippa managed to say quietly before she passed out completely, smiling like Finbar had been. Perhaps in death, they weren't as different as I had thought they had been when they were alive.<br>I continued to hit her over and over until the canon fired, when it did, I dropped my club and stood over her before kicking her lifeless body once, just to get some of the last of the pent up rage out of me.

There was a distinct gurgling noise in the near distance where Elana was lying. I remembered what had happened to her and ran over to her; I knelt down by her in her blood and wiped her forehead with the back of my hand.  
>'Give Maryana my love, won't you?' Elana asked, holding my hand with her good hand, looking at me hopefully.<br>'Of course I will.' I said.  
>I couldn't believe that the games were about to end and that I had survived. I would rather Aleksander had won but never mind, someone had to and it just happened to be me. I valued Elana's friendship a lot in the few weeks that we had known each other, if I hadn't accepted her proposal to be her ally, I wouldn't have gotten this far. The Careers would certainly have taken me down on that first time we had met with them in the alcove.<p>

'I'm going to go and see my brother, aren't I?' she smiled happily, looking at the sky. She looked peaceful and happy, it was completely beautiful see in a horribly grotesque way.  
>'Yes you are...give him my love won't you?' I said to her, stroking her forehead again. Elana laughed gently and nodded slowly.<p>

'Do me one last favour, Bella?' she asked me.  
>'Anything.' I nodded.<br>'Put me out of my misery. Do it quickly because my head really hurts.' She laughed but stopped abruptly.  
>'If you're totally sure...it doesn't mean that I want to do it though because I don't. I mean, I wanted to at first when we met but...'<br>'Bella, stop. Please?'  
>I sighed heavily and lifted her torso up so she was sat upright. I let go of her hand and bit my lip hard, hard enough to make it bleed at least.<br>'Goodnight, Lana.' I sighed. She was about to respond but I twisted her head around quickly, breaking her neck. The canon sounded and I was now the only one left.

Elana, Pippa and Finbar were are lying still on the sand, it scared me a little bit, not as much as the blood bath at the Conrucopia. There were far more bodies there. I never want to see that many dead bodies again, that's going to make watching the next Hunger Games very difficult. Not only would that be a problem, but the fact that I had to mentor the next district six tributes to do the games next year would also be an issue that I would have to overcome.  
>I didn't even notice that the fanfare was playing and a voice was being projected in to the arena. That was probably because I wasn't really listening to what it was saying. I just wanted to go home.<p>

'I'm so sorry, Maryana...I couldn't help, I...'  
>I was interrupted by my sister laughing gently.<p>

'It's okay, sweetheart. You're back safely and that's all that matters.'  
>'But Aleksander! You were getting married and now...' I trailed off, hugging my sister tightly.<p>

'I knew that I was going to lose one of you or both of you, I had time to prepare myself. I grieved Aleksander and yes, I am still upset but it's okay. I'm stronger than I look.' She kissed the top of my head and sighed. 'Just be happy that you're alive.'

My reunion with my family was a great one; I had never been hugged so much in my life. I was so glad to be back, because if I had been away in that death filled dome of a desert for any longer, I surely would have gone mad. I couldn't help but still feel incredibly sad though. In that arena, I had lost a brother and, in my eyes, a sister as well.


End file.
